1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is an improved system and method for processing a watermark on a document. More particularly, the present invention includes a system for verifying that a watermark is present on an image of the document and that the watermark is the correct watermark for the document.
2. Background Art
Checks are prepared in large quantities and represent “cash” to many in society today. Those checks are distributed for a variety of purposes—payroll, paying bills, purchasing goods and services, paying debts and dividends and interest. The volume of checks has been growing each year despite the rise of substitutes for cash, such as debit and credit cards, automatic teller machines, electronic funds transfers, automatic deposit of payments, automatic debits for bills and recurring transfers, electronic bill payment systems and other similar methods of conveying cash from one account to another.
As the number of checks increase, there is an increasing desire to process those checks quickly and efficiently, with a minimum of manual handling and a maximum application of automated processing techniques. Most checks are processed through a banking system (which includes both governmental central banking systems and commercial bank-like institutions such as commercial banks, savings and loan organizations, credit unions and other bank-like or bank-servicing operations), where checks are processed in an automated fashion to extract the information, then forwarding document (or the information contained thereon) to other institutions as necessary for the collection of the check. Some check processing facilities receive in excess of one million items per day for processing. High speed check processing equipment (such as the IBM 3890 Document Processing System) have become common place for processing the checks in such facilities where large numbers of checks are received each business day. Many of the check processing systems include an image capture device such as the ImagePlus High Performance Transaction System which IBM introduced in recent years to capture an image of the front and back of the check while it is being read and processed in the document processing system, between the time that the check is removed from a hopper at one end of the machine until it reaches a selected pocket at the other end of the machine. Such a system is described in the Check Image Patent referenced above.
As the number of checks increases, each check receives less and less manual attention and processing, relying on the automated equipment to do more of the processing. A check may have the account number and amount fee encoded on the check before the check is received and it may be provided with a tape listing of the amounts so that very little (if any) manual processing happens for each check in the banking system.
The increasing amount of automation and the decrease in manual processing along with an increase in sophisticated equipment for imitating a check opens the possibility for fraudulent activity in preparing and presenting checks. A criminal could take a genuine check and duplicate it (using techniques such as a photocopier), creating multiple similar checks or check blanks for fraudulent use or use a digital scanner to create a similar looking but totally bogus duplicate or blank check and use the bogus check improperly. Further, software for the creation of authentic-looking checks on a low-cost personal computer printer is widely available, complete with the appropriate magnetic ink character recognition symbols, checks which at one time were only available from large check printing companies using high-cost equipment. These examples illustrate that the spread of technology into low cost and widely-available hardware and software has made the production of fraudulent checks available at a nominal cost to those who need only a small investment and little, if any, technical expertise.
Since it is quick, easy and inexpensive to create fraudulent checks, it is not surprising that the number of such checks is increasing and has reached substantial proportions. It is accordingly a limitation of the prior art systems for processing checks that a simple, yet effective, way of detecting possibly fraudulent checks is not a part of the check processing systems.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to have a system which automatically detects whether a check is authentic. Such a system should be rather easy to use and allow for different watermarks to be on checks from different accounts. Such a system should also be difficult to fool with a photocopied check or a check which is printed using software and a laser printer.
But checks are frequently “busy”, both initially when printed (with logos and scenic backgrounds) and, as the checks are sent through the acceptance process, it may acquire additional information (identification of the receiving clerk, approvals, identification of the person presenting the check, account number, etc.) which may appear in various locations on each check in a random location. As the check goes through a collection process, additional information may be placed on the check either manually or through the use of automated equipment—such as endorsements, where the check was processed, an item number, a paid stamp and other useful information in handling the check if it returned unpaid. Accordingly, each check becomes unique in bearing a variable amount of information located in diverse locations on the two sides of the check.
Any information placed on the check as a result of its original creation may be overwritten through the additional information which is placed on the check during preparation or during its processing. Such overwriting of random information in random locations makes it difficult to locate information which may have been printed on the check in a certain place to detect fraud.
Various security measures are already in use in check processing. One of these is the use of microprinting of the signature line, which has the advantage that the printing becomes blurred when the microprinting is photocopied. The signature line printed using microprint technology creates a signature line which is discontinuous (having gaps smaller than the resolution of a photocopier or digital scanner) but which appears to the eye and to mechanical devices as a solid line. When a check with a microprint line is duplicated through a photocopied or a digital scanner, the line becomes solid, allowing differentiation of the original check (with a discontinuous microprint line) from the duplicated check (with a solid line).
Another technique for deterring the use of a photocopier to make a duplicate of a genuine check is the so-called “void pantograph”, a recurring printed pattern which, when produces a distinctive pattern of “VOID” legends across the check when photocopied but which is not apparent on the original check.
Various systems have been proposed for authenticating documents and images. One such system involves visually detecting a watermark which appears on an image and comparing the watermark to the watermark which is supposed to appear on the document. If the watermark is appropriate, then the document is presumed to be authentic and if the watermark is not present or has an incorrect appearance, then the document is suspect and presumed to be improper, perhaps because the document was prepared from a different paper stock than was authorized or perhaps because the document was altered at some point. In any case, to avoid a fraudulent transaction, the document would require careful attention—e.g., handling by hand rather than through an automated processing.
Many checks are processed at high speed through automatic processing systems known as document processors such as the IBM 3890 Document Processor. Such machines remove a single check from a stack of checks at an input hopper, move it along a pathway inside the processor past a read head which determines the particulars of the check (including the account and the amount) and then sorts the check into an appropriate pocket based on the information contained on the check. During the processing, the check may have information added to the check (such as an item number and/or an endorsement) and an image of the check may be captured, either through microfilming the check or through an image capture system using a digital camera.
Prior art watermark detecting systems have other limitations and disadvantages which will be apparent to those skilled in the art in view of the following description of the present invention.